Friday, May 27, 2005

They hold swords during photo shoots. This band is probably not joking around.

I have been listening to their glorious Dawn of Victory all morning and I am a) in the mood to slay a dragon, b) watch Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, or c) go to a local costume store and buy a long flowing "tress" (this word can only be used in reference to metal band members) and leather pants, and then walk around like I have to go make #2 really bad.

Incorporating flutes, fiddles, a children's choir and actor Christopher Lee into their repertoire (It's true. Count Dooku guests on their song, "Unholy Warcry"), Rhapsody is not a conventional metal band. In fact, tagging them as metal seems a bit short-sighted. I would say they're closer to achieving the rarest of prog-metals (oooh, it just got worse, didn't it?), adding guitar solos that intertwine with ominous organs and doomsday operatic choirs. Just listen to the drama and shredding found in songs like "The Mighty Ride of the Firelord" and "Triumph For My Magic Steel" (I couldn't make these titles up)--you will feel like you're flying, naturally, on Pegasus. They film their videos outside ancient castles and feature a flying dragon on almost all their cover art. When I listen to Italy's premiere metal band on the commute into work, I may as well be a knight in shining armor galloping on my noble steed called the B Train on my way to slay the man-eating corporate dragon, saving humanity from the evils of the soul-sucking routine. But then I get to my desk and think, who am I kidding? And then I spend my day looking for near stuff on eBay.

Firstly, the members of this band are not mere mortals. They are obviously Norse gods (in truth, they refer to themselves as "warriors"). Their names are Perspicacious Protector, Cosmic Antagonist, Preternatural Transmogrifyer, and Transcendental Protagonist, which I'm sure are all a bitch for telemarketers to pronounce.With the flying saucer sound effects that open this album, you know that Lost Horizon's latest opus A Flame To The Ground Beneath is an other-worldly experience. This second recording is a new age metal journey that feels both molten hot and ice cold at the same time. Preternatural's vocals are insanely range-errific climbing to the highest banshee shreiks of a woman in pain. Their mission (from their website): "Our wish is to help all those whose existence have gradually turned to complete misery through the interference and affection of extremely negative powers in different shapes, that through, among other things, misleading, corruption, confusion, indoctrination, rottenness, creating of guilt and fear, have poisoned the individual. The ones who are victims of lies, stupidity, primitivism, blindness, limitation, weakness, self-destruction, low self-esteem, goallesness, etcetera. Those who have fallen into the darkest abyss and stumble in darkness."Start with me, dudes! Start with me!

While listening to Lost Horizon on my way to work, I sometimes imagine that I have a laser gun and a glowing laser sword that can slay the evil doers who bump into me before I've had my morning coffee. I am merciless.